


The Great Train Escapade

by Kereea



Series: Perry the Evil-Adjacent Boyfriend [11]
Category: Phineas and Ferb
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Comedy, Drama, Gen, Human Perry the Platypus (Phineas and Ferb), M/M, Trains, fears
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-14
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-10-10 03:44:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17418449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kereea/pseuds/Kereea
Summary: Peter and Mystery are teamed up with Agent Lyla from COWCA to stop Heinz and Perry from stealing precious Albert the Moose…except Heinz and Perry were actually on the train to try and get Candace over a train phobia.And that’s when things get really weird.





	The Great Train Escapade

 “All right, all right, I said _Pinky_ was okay. This is not Pinky!” Mystery said, gesturing to the picture of a woman on the screen. “That is not a skinny Ashkenazi teenager prone to calling people ‘dude’ in any way!”

 Monogram sighed, “Are you finished?”

 “Need I remind you I am solely invested in this endeavor for revenge on Heinz Doofenshmirtz, _not_ shoring up other agents?” Mystery asked, tapping his foot.

 “Agent P, can you please— _Peter the Panda_ , pay attention!” Monogram barked.

 Peter glanced up from his puzzle booklet and signed that he was just waiting for Monogram and Mystery to finish arguing for the day.

 “He, uh, has a point, sir. It’s gotten a lot more common,” Carl admitted from off camera. “Some agents even take bets now.”

 Monogram and Mystery scowled.

 “Agent P, could you please _explain_ why working with COWCA is necessary given the location of the train?” Monogram asked, exasperated.

 Peter pulled out his notebook and drew a diagram explaining the train followed part of the Canadian-American border, and thus was in both jurisdictions. Therefore their options were to wither work with a Canadian operative, or get in a fight with COWCA.

 “I could go for throwing down with some Canadians,” Mystery huffed.

 Peter underlined the statement about working with a Canadian operative, indicating which choice they’d be taking.

 “Who put you in charge?” Mystery muttered.

 “…I did,” Monogram pointed out. “Dismissed.”

.o.o.o.

 Peter rolled his eyes. Mystery had spent the entire flight complaining.

 Of course, OWCA had just assumed Mystery would go with it. Not only had the work with Pinky gone well, but Mystery kind of had been thwarting Doof and Fletcher alongside Peter for over a month now! Of _course_ they assumed he’d just roll with things!

 Peter really had to wonder if Mystery had his endgame thought through here. Constantly thwarting Heinz hadn’t made the man slow down at all, much less give up evil and allow Peter to be reassigned as Mystery’s nemesis. For the foreseeable future, Mystery was stuck allied with OWCA.

 Peter wondered when the guy’s “revenge!” reserves were going to run dry. He also wondered if some of the mysterious schemes he’d thwarted in the past had been revenge oriented and he just hadn’t noticed.

 They landed on top of the train, quickly joined by Agent Lyla Loliberry of COWCA.

 “Hello, Agent P. And, it’s Professor Mystery, right?” Lyla asked.

 Mystery nodded. “Let’s just get this over with.”

 “He seems cheery,” Lyla commented quietly to Peter. Peter shrugged. Mystery hadn’t threatened her, so honestly this was going well.

 They found a hatch and went to work opening it, and Peter and Mystery dropped into the dining car.

 “Peter the Panda and Professor Mystery? What are you _doing_ here?” Heinz asked blankly.

 Lyla dropped in as well, only for all three agents to jerk at a muffled shriek.

 They turned slightly to the left to see Vanessa with her hand over Candace’s mouth, Perry trying to silently calm Candace down, and Phineas and Ferb looking worried.

 “…Uh…is this…not a scheme to kidnap precious Albert the Moose?” Lyla asked.

 “What? Kidnap the _moose_?” Heinz asked. “Do, do you know how _big_ a moose is? And how stubborn? Urgh, no, way too much work. Totally different plan in mind, it’s for when we get there.”

 “Then _why_ are you on the train?” Mystery asked.

 “We’re trying to get Candace over her fear of trains. You’re not helping,” Vanessa said, taking her hand off Candace’s mouth as Ferb passed Candace a glass of water.

 “…Oops. Well, don’t you worry, eh Candace?” Lyla said, smiling reassuringly. “If your uncle and the doc aren’t trying to kidnap Precious Albert, there will be no shenanigans from us. All right?”

 Candace nodded suspiciously.

 “Great!” Lyla said. “We’ll just enjoy the ride and get to the thwarting once we’re actually at the destination! Everyone wins!”

 Peter asked if Candace was going to be okay.

 “I’m cool. Cool, cool, cool,” Candace said, taking some deep breaths.

 Peter frowned. Usually Candace was dismissive of the goings-on between Heinz, her uncle, and any agents about. She typically only wasn’t when she somehow ended up involved, and then she usually was rather solid about her goals. Freaked out was…new.

 “Hey, what’s that?” Lyla asked suspiciously, pointing to a small device sticking out of Heinz’s labcoat.

  “Huh, oh, this is my Train Controlinator,” Heinz said, pulling it out to show them the little box. “In case of emergency, I can take control of the train and slow it down or stop it or whatever. You know, backup plans. It’s just in case, really.”

 “Oh, good idea,” Lyla said, eyeing Candace’s obvious nervousness.

 “…I just realized something,” Mystery said.

 “ _What_?” Candace asked, wide-eyed.

 “Nothing to do with trains!” Mystery said quickly. “But…if Doctor Doofenshmirtz is going to do something at Canada Day for the other guy…who’s stopping _him_ from doing a scheme back at DEI?”

 “Well, since I’m here…uh-oh,” Lyla said, putting her hand to her mouth.

 Perry snickered.

 “Okay, yeah, big oversight there,” Mystery agreed as Phineas and Ferb both laughed along with their uncle and Peter frantically pulled out his phone to text OWCA. “So, uh, Candace…doing all right there?”

 “No battling and I’ll be fine,” Candace said. “Just fine.”

 “Trains, eh? Anything, err, behind that?” Lyla asked.

 Candace, Phineas, and Ferb winced as Vanessa signaled for Lyla to change the subject. Perry briefly scowled.

 Peter handed Lyla his phone. “Oh! Uh, it says that the…inator was fired, but they don’t know what it did!”

 “Then _your_ nemesis doesn’t know how to aim!” Heinz complained. “Ooh, this is going to put me so off schedule, too! I, I had something _else_ planned for tomorrow and now I have to push _that_ back as well, and I mean really, this is not how the exchange program was supposed to go-”

 Perry patted him on the shoulder consolingly.

 “Huh. I’ll take not needing to thwart twice today,” Mystery said, pulling out one of the train’s menus. “Ooh, have any of you tried the fries yet?”

 “They’re good,” Phineas said, Perry nodding in agreement. 

 “Sweet,” Mystery said, pushing the call button.

 “I could go for more fries,” Vanessa agreed.

 “Sweet, let’s get fries,” Heinz said.

 Things settled down and Peter pulled his puzzle book back out. He briefly had to show it to Phineas and Ferb when they wanted to know what he was doing, and then Ferb went and figured out half of a sudoku before Peter could stop him.

 Weird kids, but cute.

 A waiter brought them the fries, and everyone happily dug in. Heinz tried to get Lyla to explain if there were different trends among Canadian evil scientists vs. American evil scientists, while Vanessa calmly put in ear buds to ignore everyone.

 The train lurched a little. Candace shrieked and latched onto Perry.

 “It’s okay, you’re okay,” Heinz said as Perry hugged Candace and patted her head.

 “Probably just took a hard turn, eh?” Lyla suggested.

 “Aren’t turns the likeliest place for a train to derail?” Candace asked, panicking.

 “But we didn’t!” Phineas said.

 “We’re also going at a very safe speed, according to my GPS and train statistics,” Mystery said, checking his phone.

 “See everything’s-” Heinz started, only for the train to lurch again. “…Okay, going to go yell at the conductor, now.”

 “I’ll go with you. He’s not being careful enough with Precious Albert!” Lyla said.

 “Here, hang onto this,” Heinz said, passing his train controller to Phineas and Ferb since Perry’s hands were full with Candace for the moment. “And no cannibalizing the car for inventions while I’m gone!”

 “It’s not like this is going to take long,” Phineas said, shrugging. Ferb gave Heinz a thumbs up, and Heinz and Lyla set off.

 “It’s going to be okay, Candace, here,” Vanessa said, taking out her buds and passing them over. “Maybe listen to some music.”

 “We’re gonna die,” Candace whimpered.

 “Kid, there’s two evil scientists, two agents, your little brothers, and your weirdly skilled uncle here. Well be fine,” Mystery said.

.o.o.o.

 Heinz and Lyla made their way through the front cars.

 “So…trains?” Lyla checked.

 “Her folks. Accident. Nightmares. _Really_ long backstory,” Heinz summed up.

 “Oof, and this was supposed to get her over it…” Lyla mused as they reached the engine. “Where’s the conductor? And what’s this thing on the console?”

 “Oh, great, someone else took over the train,” Heinz muttered. “Wait. Someone _else_ took over the train?”

 “They must be after Albert!” Lyla said, trying to take the controls and failing. “And we can’t slow down!”

 “Oh, wow, Candace is so never getting on a train _again_ after today,” Heinz muttered, getting his phone. “Hi, boys? Yeah, um, take control of the train now please. Well, we have no conductor and are accelerating…yeah, we don’t know what happened to him, weird, huh? Oh, oh no…”

 Lyla winced as she heard Candace start screaming over the phone.

 “Is it stabilizing?” Heinz asked Lyla, holding the phone away from his ear.

 “We’re starting to slow down…” Lyla mused. “Looks like your inator’s going to save the day here!”

 “Tell Candace it’s working and we’re going to be fine,” Heinz said into the phone. “…What do you mean the signal’s being interfered with? _Who_ would be able to _interfere_ with my inator? Steal Mystery’s phone, make sure it’s not him!”

 “And…speeding up again,” Lyla groaned. “Doofenshmirtz, if your inator can’t keep control, we’re going to need a new plan.”

.o.o.o.

 “I’m not doing it, see?” Mystery said as Vanessa inspected his phone and Phineas and Ferb commandeered the floor to try and fix the Train Controlinator.

 “Okay, yeah,” Vanessa said, giving his phone back. “Boys, give me something here.”

 “Well, it’s wireless, so it kind of lives or dies on its signal-” Phineas said, only to wince when Candace gasped on ‘dies.’

 “If someone blocks wireless communication, we _really_ can’t do much here…” Ferb sighed.

 Peter passed them a note thanking them for trying.

 “No communication is pretty suspicious,” Mystery said, scowling as his phone couldn’t find any networks. “It might not even be someone intentionally blocking Dr. Doofenshmirtz’s device. They might be trying to block people from making calls, or…or anything…”

 “But we know this is intentional,” Vanessa said. She looked questioningly at Perry, who seemed to understand where she was taking it and gave her a firm nod in reply. “Someone’s endangering this whole train…and we need to figure out how to bust them and save the day.”

 Candace froze. Her eyes narrowed. “Oh, they are so going down.”

 With Candace distracted, Perry grabbed Mystery and the two of them tried to help Phineas and Ferb out.

 Lyla’s voice came over the intercom. “Hello, I need everyone to not panic-”

 Everyone else in the car started panicking.

 “Well. That didn’t work,” Phineas said. “I can’t hear the rest of the announcement. Peter, can you contact Lyla?”

 Peter tried his agent com, then shook his head.

 “Maybe we make a signal-jammer- _jammer_ …” Mystery mused.

 “Is that even a thing?” Vanessa asked.

 “We can find out!” Mystery said.

 “Yeah, let’s start there—oh, hey Dr. D,” Phineas said as Heinz and Lyla reappeared.

 “Hi, eh. Well…we can’t slow down,” Lyla sighed.

 “We’re going to move everyone to the caboose and decouple it from the train,” Heinz said. “Then between the boys, Mystery, and me, we should be able to rig something to get the caboose the rest of the way to the celebration, where we can proceed as normal.”

 Perry nodded. That sounded good.

 “Isn’t the caboose where your moose is? We have to share with a _moose_?” Mystery whined.

 “Is there something _wrong_ with Albert the Moose?” Lyla asked.

 Mystery went to argue, only for Peter to pick him up and start walking down the train. “Oh, come on!”

 Perry scooped Phineas and Ferb up and followed Peter, with Heinz, Candace, Vanessa, and Lyla bringing up the rear.

 “So, we’ll stop speeding once we disconnect the caboose?” Candace asked Lyla nervously.

 “Should work just fine,” Lyla reassured her as they stepped into the now-crowded yet still very elegant final car of the train.

 “…This is for a _moose_ ,” Mystery griped as Peter put him back down.

 “Yeah, kind of weird. I know you love him, but weird,” Vanessa told Lyla as Perry and Heinz decoupled the caboose from the rest of the train, which zoomed off without them.

 “Woo-hoo! Home free! As soon as we engineer a motor for this thing…” Heinz mused as the caboose started to slow down without the rest of the train to pull it.

 “I’m thinking more….giant spider legs,” Phineas said. Ferb gave his idea two thumbs up.

 “Yeah, okay, that’s going to take scraping some of the car…maybe the roof, some of the decorative railings…” Mystery mused, tapping one of the metal walls.

 The caboose jolted, making Candace scream.

 “Oh, what _now_?” Heinz complained. “We just finished dealing with the other thing! What could possibly-”

 “Cables attached to a helicopter trying to lift the caboose,” Lyla said, peering out the window.

 Perry groaned and signed that of _course_ there were.

 “It seems to be struggling on the lift…do you think it didn’t expect the caboose to be this heavy?” Heinz asked as Peter handed Candace a bag to hyperventilate into.

 Phineas and Ferb shared looks before quietly ducking behind Albert and out of sight.

 “Of course! We evacuated everyone in here, that’s probably thousands of more pounds to lift!” Lyla said.

 “True but when you’re lifting a train car with a moose that’s usually heavily guarded, wouldn’t you _expect_ a heavy load?” Mystery asked.

 “All right, so we have to cut the cables before we can… _where_ are the boys?” Heinz asked, wide-eyed.

 “They were _right_ here!” Vanessa said.

 “Oh no, no,” Candace said, looking around. “Phineas? Ferb? _Phineas? **Ferb**?_”

 Peter waved Perry over to the window and pointed up.

 Perry looked up, following the cables…just in time to see his nephews finish shimmying up them and board the chopper that had lifted the caboose.

 He looked at Peter and they mutually nodded. Truce. The raced after the boys.

.o.o.o.

 “Ah-ha-ha, and so only _now_ does OWCA…wait, who, who are you?” the bespectacled evil scientist asked Phineas and Ferb as the climbed aboard.

 “I’m Phineas and that’s Ferb, and you need to stop scaring our sister by putting the train car down now, thanks,” Phineas said.

 “Ha-ha! Two _children_ expect to command the famed Professor Bannister!” Bannister laughed.

 “I _mean_ it! Stop it right now! You’re _scaring_ our _sister_!” Phineas said angrily.

 “You’re… _not_ OWCA, then?” Bannister asked. “Ha-ha! Then my plan shall go—whoa!”

 He ducked the ninja stars Ferb threw at him.

 “ _How_ did you get those on a train?” Bannister demanded.

 “Made them out of the silverware,” Ferb replied. “Now _stop scaring our sister_!”

 “Two little boys don’t scare—oh,” Bannister said as Perry and Peter climbed aboard the chopper. “Well. Okay then, two OWCA agents-”

 Peter angrily signed that Perry was _not_ an agent.

 “…Sorry, don’t understand sign. Sorry,” Bannister said. “Anyway, two agents is nothing! Meet Me Positive, and Me Negative!”

 Perry and Peter shared confused looks, until two robots came from under Bannister’s coat and revealed him to be even skinnier than Heinz.

 “You had those under there the whole time? That seems hazardous,” Phineas commented as Perry and Peter engaged the robots.

 “Now then, I shall steal the—whoa! Right, ninja stars,” Bannister muttered as Ferb threw more at him.

 “Phineas and Ferb, you are _so_ busted!”

 “Candace!” Phineas said happily. “You’re okay!”

 “And you two are in such trouble!” Candace said as she finished climbing into the chopper. “And _you_!” She pointed at Bannister. “Who do you think you are, scaring a whole train of people over _one_ _moose_!”

 “Without Precious Albert, Canada Day will be ruined!” Bannister cackled, only to yelp as Candace lunged for him and started chasing him around the cargo hold. 

 “Go Candace!” Phineas cheered. The chopper lurched. “Uh oh. Ferb, come on!”

 The boys hurried over to the controls.

 Heinz and Lyla scrambled aboard the chopper, only to stop in confusion.

 “…Okay, someone’s going to need to catch us up,” Heinz said as he and Lyla looked at Perry and Peter fighting robots while Candace chased Bannister and Phineas and Ferb tried to take control of the chopper.

 “Wait, Bannister is a skinny little guy?” Lyla asked.

 “Wow. How long has he been wearing those robots?” Phineas asked Ferb. Ferb shrugged. “Uh, Agent Loliberry, can you maybe do this? We don’t know how Canadian aircraft well enough to fix this!”

 Lyla quickly took Ferb’s seat, Ferb hopping over to share with Phineas, “Ooh, you were actually doing really well! Here, let me show you how this works…”

 Heinz took a few steps forward and stuck his leg out to trip Bannister for Candace. Bannister tumbled to the ground, his coat falling open to show the flag of Greenland, not Canada.

 “…I fell like that should mean something,” Candace commented.

 “Probably a whole backstory,” Heinz admitted as Bannister groaned and rubbed his head.

 “Doofenshmirtz? What are you doing?” Bannister said.

 “Stopping the guy scaring my littler girl,” Heinz said, folding his arms and scowling at Bannister.

 “Also: busting you!” Candace added. “Uh…what now?”

 Perry and Peter managed to get the robots stuck together, leaving Bannister without any options.

 “Woo! Great job everyone!” Phineas cheered, only to grin nervously as Perry turned to him and Ferb and gave them a firm signing-to about going after villains on their own, even if it was for Candace. "Oops. Yeah, sorry, Uncle Perry."

 “I just hope Precious Albert is okay,” Lyla said.

.o.o.o.

 “I didn’t know it was possible for a moose to drink from a teacup without spilling,” Mystery commented as Albert’s butler finished serving everyone in the caboose tea.

 “He is famous for it, sir,” the butler said.

 “Huh,” Vanessa said.

.o.o.o.

 Albert the Moose and everyone else were flown straight to the Canada Day celebrations, with Lyla happily instructing Phineas and Ferb in piloting along the way. Professor Bannister was arrested by COWCA as soon as they landed.

 “Ah, there he is,” Lyla sighed happily as Albert was led to the stage. “Well, Doofenshmirtz, where’s that plan of yours. Going to cut Albert’s mic?”

 “You gave the moose a mic?” Candace asked as Heinz started to cackle.

 “You _fools_! My plan has already been enacted!”

 “…When? We were with you the whole flight,” Mystery said. Peter glared at him. “Okay, _Peter_ was, but in my defense Vanessa and I were having a very important discussion about combat boot brands _and_ I’ve never been one to shimmy up cables. Seriously. I couldn’t even climb the rope in gym class.”

 Perry told them they’d just missed it, and that the kids could go get ice cream while the adults did their schemes and thwarting. Candace sighed, but took the money he passed her.

 “Exactly! For, you see, I have _masterfully_ taken over Albert the Moose’s Twitter feed!” Heinz laughed, brandishing his phone. “He shall be shamed before all the online world with more gaffes than you’d ever think a moose capable of on a national holiday! Mwa-ha-haha!”

 “Get back here!” Mystery yelled as Heinz and Perry darted into the crowd, Heinz yelling for the kids to “Have fun!” over his shoulder.

 Peter stopped Mystery, reminding him that they were in Canada, and thus out of jurisdiction.

 “I got this, eh!” Lyla said, giving chase to Heinz and Perry.

 Peter asked if they could join the kids for ice cream.

 “Yeah, sounds good,” Vanessa said. “Let’s go.”

 “How long do you think that scheme’s going to take?” Candace asked.

 “Dr. D. and Uncle Perry are _awfully_ good at keep-away,” Phineas said. As if to prove his point, Lyla managed to tackle Heinz, but not before Heinz threw the phone to Perry several dozen feet away. “Could be a while.”

 “…So, Phineas, Ferb, what are your opinions on subverting the law of gravity?” Mystery asked.

 “Universal laws with no hope of appeal are despotism,” Phineas said. “So yeah, it’s fun to mess with.”

 “We made our whole backyard an antigravity zone, once,” Ferb said as they entered the ice cream shop.

 “Oh, I’ve got to head this,” Mystery said.

 “Okay!” Phineas said. “So, first we had to come up with a way to keep the effect localized…”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Candace Flynn has been scared of trains ever since The Accident, and of COURSE this is what happens when she tries to get over that fear. Phineas and Ferb Do Not Like It when people scare their sister. 
> 
> Mystery's starting to get a lil' bit comfortable with his position, at least enough to constantly argue with Monogram. Peter's right to wonder where this is all going. 
> 
> Heinz's plan failed since he tweeted as Albert when Albert was on stage and obviously not tweeting. Albert the Moose is not to be confused with Albert the Older Brother of Irving.


End file.
